What is there to dislike about it. If you know you will be stopped for a while it makes it quieter and saves fuel. If you are in stop start traffic you can disable it or move the steering wheel and it stops the engine cutting out.

You are not alone. I plan to shut it off and never use it, should my next BMW have that "feature". I do not want my car turning off and on by itself, all to save a miniscule amount of fuel. No, thank you, BMW!

It can't be disabled unless possibly through accessing the OBC via a homebrewed connection of sorts which could cause all kinds of other woes. More more example of BMW, like Apple, thinking they know what is best for us. Kinda like our new Gubmint.

Start/Stop can be coded to remember that last setting used so that if you set it to "off", it will remain off every time you get in the vehicle. BMW will recode it one time upon request, or you can can recode it yourself. April 1 on boards has great directions for this

I thought i would hate it and planned on turning it off always but was amazed at how seamless it was on the X3 35i I testdrove.

That being said, I would shut it off in thick stop-and-go traffic jams and that sort of thing but would definately leave it online for stopping at longer traffic lights etc. The first few times the auto-start/stop functioned in the 35i I drove, I didn't even know it happened. I just noticed the fan speed for the climate control go up and down and I figured it must have been an ED function or something until I realized it was going down because the engine was shutting off and then going up when releasing brake pressure due to engine starting up.

It has its plus points.. when I am on a low fuel drive and wanting to get good mileage, then when it cuts off when i stop at lights etc, then it stops the numbers dropping while sat there yet if i want to be in spirited mode, I just turn it off.. its not like it forces you to use it all the time.

I moved from a Nissan Altima Hybrid to the X3 and it is very noticable in the X3. In the Altima for the most part I never noticed the engine going on or off, with the X3 I sometimes notice the engine going off and almost always notice it turning back on. For now I plan to use it and find it works well with Auto Hold.

I haven't found it too annoying in my 35i. It is certainly noticeable when the engine turns back on...even causing the car to shimmy a little bit. I haven't had any issue with the delay not allowing me to accelerate as quickly as I'd like from a stop.

One thing though. Is it designed to activate the engine after 15 seconds or so regardless of lifting off of the brake or moving the steering wheel? I feel like it shuts the engine down, but then if I do nothing it turns back on on its own after 10-15 seconds.

I haven't found it too annoying in my 35i. It is certainly noticeable when the engine turns back on...even causing the car to shimmy a little bit. I haven't had any issue with the delay not allowing me to accelerate as quickly as I'd like from a stop.

One thing though. Is it designed to activate the engine after 15 seconds or so regardless of lifting off of the brake or moving the steering wheel? I feel like it shuts the engine down, but then if I do nothing it turns back on on its own after 10-15 seconds.

I don't think that is the design. In the test car I drove, though, I noticed that lifting on the brake pedal even very slightly would cause the engine to start back up.

I hear BMW is going to have a run on replacement starters in 2 years when the starters stop working.

Why? They've been doing this for a few years now in Europe, this isn't really a new feature. They're using heavy duty starter motors to make sure they don't just go bad. If there were major issues like this, surely they would have discovered them already and addressed them so they don't have to deal with a wave of warranty claims from it.

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Originally Posted by wedge000

I haven't found it too annoying in my 35i. It is certainly noticeable when the engine turns back on...even causing the car to shimmy a little bit. I haven't had any issue with the delay not allowing me to accelerate as quickly as I'd like from a stop.

One thing though. Is it designed to activate the engine after 15 seconds or so regardless of lifting off of the brake or moving the steering wheel? I feel like it shuts the engine down, but then if I do nothing it turns back on on its own after 10-15 seconds.

It depends on the temperature. The engine shuts off and the computer watches the temperature of the climate control, and when it detects that the air is no longer cold/hot enough to keep up with climate demand it turns the engine back on. I'm guessing when it's no longer summertime it will stay off for longer.